« In Which Fainting Is The First Of Many Symptoms »

Consciousness

by MOLLY O'BRIEN

A woman fainted on the subway this morning. The Q plunged into darkness after rattling over the Manhattan Bridge, and then it happened. I didn't see it. There were too many people in the way. What I saw were the reactions of every person who watched her faint. New Yorkers are inured to public displays of affection and celebrities. Nothing shocks them except the sight of someone losing consciousness.

It didn't take long for her to revive. "She's blinking, that's a good sign," said a woman near me. "Are you all right?" asked thirteen different people. "I'm fine," she said. I caught a glimpse of her − thin, with red hair and that telltale pale post-faint face. Then she disappeared again, so I pricked my ears and listened.

"Did you have anything to eat this morning?" asked the man who stepped into the role of chief caretaker.

"Yeah...yeah, I did."

"Has this happened before?"

"No, it hasn't." For the rest of the ride, a group of commuters gently surrounded her, asking little questions, like pediatricians. I got off at Herald Square and thought about her for the rest of the day. I hope someone had the good sense to steer her toward orange juice.

I am a fainter, so all other fainters are kindred spirits to me. St. Valentine is more than a representative for affianced couples and beekeepers − he's the patron saint of fainting. And we need him! We fainters are at the mercy of the world: we are fine, and yet we’re a whoosh away from unconsciousness; we are hypersensitive to the conditions that spell our downfall (hot weather, dehydration, long periods of standing and walking). We understand how dangerous it is to be exactly our body's height from the floor, and how dangerous it can be to be alone. Someone caught that girl on the subway before she hit the ground. Public places are better places to pass out. Sure, public fainting means public embarrassment, but things end up worse when you are by yourself.

The first time I fainted, I was nine years old, combing my hair before school. It was hard to get any time alone with five other family members sharing one tiny bathroom, so when I got the mirror to myself, I set to work on taming the cowlick that sprung from my bangs. Combing it down, combing it down...the next thing I knew, I was sitting in the carpeted hallway and my mother was looking into my eyeballs: "You fainted."

Because it was the first time, I didn't recognize any of the hallmarks of passing out for what they were, all of those freaky sensory things that tend to occur on the way down, and so I couldn’t remember what happened, not now, not even then. My mother was concerned, and yet I believe I was sent to school that day. Why should I have stayed home? I hadn't vomited or bled. I was fine. Much of the work that comes after fainting involves discerning your post-fainting state: either you are 'fine' or 'not fine.' Chipper demeanor, dilating pupils? Fine. Grey-green face, colorless lips, bad case of the shakes? Not fine.

A couple months later, it was summer and I was at a basketball day camp, miserable. Before the day's scrimmages were the brutal warm-ups. The Catholic school's gym was hot, and I hadn't drunk enough water. "High knees!" said the coach. (In my memory, he is a sinister guy.) Across the floor, I hoofed it, hustling, high knees, high knees...and then the sounds that reached my ears turned wonky, bouncing basketballs sounded like drops of water in a lake, the coach's whistle seemed very close and then very far away, and everything before my eyes went shimmery, then black.

This time I wasn't as lucky: I fell face-first on the hardwood and busted my lip. The adults thought I had been warming up with such intensity that I had kneed myself in the face. Ha! Like I'd ever muster that kind of enthusiasm for this sport, I thought. I felt bitterness toward basketball, glee at getting to leave camp for the day and adrenaline from collapsing and reviving. The nausea and overwhelming fatigue that set in after fainting didn't register.

The doctor probably poked and prodded, and my mother probably warned me to stay hydrated, but that was it. For a long time, I was afraid there was something very wrong with me, and I'm sure this is an anxiety common to all fainters − fear of the Ambiguous Symptom, the Unknown Illness. Part of the problem was my reading habits at the time. So many young adult novels I consumed featured kids with leukemia or brain cancer, scary and chronic and debilitating illnesses that obliterated childhoods, snuck up on the kids in small and terrifying increments. It was a just matter of time: sooner or later my fainting would manifest itself as something less vague and more toxic, something incurable. In my mind, the fainting was the first of many symptoms.

I had a couple of close calls throughout adolescence, but I was always able to waver on the edge of consciousness and hold on. It takes effort to tamp a near-blackout down to a mere dizzy spell. Here is how you do it: you have to put your head between your legs and breathe deeply and stay still. It's the same posture required of someone doing a Cold War duck-and-cover drill, and it calls a lot of attention to yourself, even as you are making yourself smaller. Water or juice − preferably orange juice, which packs in the most sugar − is crucial, but in the moment, consuming either is a disgusting chore. In the moment, it is impossible for you to want anything, crave anything, wish for anything. There are no petty desires. There are no desires at all. Is this why religions require fasting to the point of lightheadedness?

I turned seventeen and donated blood at the first opportunity. Doing so was a badge of honor at school − it meant you were older and not afraid of pain. Afterward I felt fine, grabbed a cookie, walked out of the gym, and got lunch. Then I put my head down on a cafeteria table for forty minutes, reeling, as my corn dog grew cold. My boyfriend was confused − did I want to go to the nurse? Should he get someone? No, no − I tried to explain, mumbling into the plastic tabletop, that going anywhere or getting anyone would result in my having to stand up, and standing up meant fainting, this was certain. I rode it out, but I was so exhausted from the effort that I curled up in an auditorium chair and slept through play rehearsal that afternoon. And I regretted the waste of a precious corn dog − still do, to be honest.

By the time I was a legal adult, my fainting did not terrify me the way it did when I was a kid. Sometimes it was funny and absurd. I gave blood again, like a masochist (hey, the Red Cross promised a free half gallon of ice cream to donors) and fainted in the waiting room at the Elk’s Club, landing in my friend’s lap, where she giggled for a few moments before summoning help. I fainted on my first day at my work-study job at a campus dining facility; I was mushing economy-sized cans of tuna into a hotel pan when I went out like a light. This time, the student supervisor caught me. Fainting makes me a lot like Blanche DuBois, only instead of depending on the kindness of strangers, I depend on their quick reflexes.

The last time I fainted was serious. Summer break was approaching, and I woke up early to bid a friend goodbye. On the way up the stairs, the warning signs appeared: blurred vision, fast heartbeat, whooshing in my ears. I should have parked it right on the stairs and waited; instead, like a fool, I tried to run back to my room. I woke up alone on the floor of my suite’s bathroom, head throbbing, a scrape on my right cheekbone. My arm was sore from breaking my fall. I could have broken that arm, or bashed my brains out. If I had stayed unconscious, someone would have seen my legs poking out of the doorframe and taken action. But it was just me, alone. I was not concussed, though I had a headache that lasted for 48 hours. It could have been so much worse.

The poor girl on the subway. She kept having to say she was fine. But let’s not forget the poor witnesses. I have never watched someone die, but I can imagine that watching someone faint is like watching someone die, a little bit. The fainter is there, and then they are there and not there at the same time. That’ the one hazard of fainting in public – scaring the living daylights out of those who watch you do it.

Fainters: when your witnesses ask you if you’re okay, say so. Tell them you’re fine. Then after you’ve collected yourself, ask them if they are okay as well, because when witnesses ask you if you are okay, they are really asking themselves the same question.

Molly O'Brien is the senior contributor to This Recording. She is a writer living in Brooklyn. She tumbls here. You can find an archive of her writing on This Recording here.

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